How To Disappear Completely

add a little fire to your day

I don't understand people who don't love Stravinksy. In any shape or form. *Cough* my metalhead friend. *cough, cough*

Here are two versions of the Infernal Dance of King Kashchei. The first is performed by the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Leonard Bernstein. The second is performed by the Kirov Orchestra, conducted by Valery Gergiev. You can tell Bernstein is a great Romantic at heart. And it works for the Firebird, a work from Stravinsky's earlier post-Romantic/pre-neo-classic period. Although Gergiev's version is a bit crisper.

Infernal Dance of King Kashchei_Bernstein

Infernal dance of all Kashchei's subjects_Gergiev

But I was also thinking that carving all the musical periods into philosophical eras does a disservice to the music sometimes. Think of poor Mozart. Figured as the epitome of Classical composers, of an age that valued rationality and order, the fellow is sometimes written off as...well...boring. And yet I remember in one Covenant music history course, Dr. Steele caught us all off guard with a question: what is Mozart's defining feature? None of us found the answer he was looking for: drama. Pure drama.